The release of the latest ABA employment data offers an opportunity to update the three-year federal judicial clerkship placement rates. Here is the clerkship placement rate for the Classes of 2014, 2015, and 2016. Methodology and observations below the interactive visualization. The "placement" is the three-year total placement; the "percentage" is the three-year placement divided by the three-year graduating class total.

The placement is based on graduates reported as having a full-time, long-term federal clerkship. (A one-year term clerkship counts for this category.) I thought a three-year average for clerkships (over 3600 clerks from the graduating classes of 2014, 2015, and 2016) would be a useful metric to smooth out any one-year outliers. It does not include clerkships obtained by students after graduation; it only includes clerkships obtained by each year's graduating class.

I included some schools that had only one or two year's worth of data, like the separate Penn State schools. Additionally, I merged the entries for William Mitchell and Hamline into Mitchell|Hamline. The three schools in Puerto Rico are excluded.

I should add that we've actually seen a slight decline in graduates placed into federal clerkships, just under 1200 for the second year in a row. Given last year's figures, some might think this is a trend toward judges hiring more clerks with work experience. I'm not sure that's the case. Instead, I would venture to guess that because the Senate last confirmed a federal judge in November 2015, we may be experiencing an unusual number of vacancies--and, therefore, lack of slots for clerkship hires. In the event the President nominates, and Congress confirms, these judges, we could see a few hundred more clerkship openings in the near future. And if Congress chooses to create more judgeships consistent with the recommendations of the Federal Judicial Center, we'd see even more.

I'll highlight two smaller charts first. The first is New York law school placement.